Purple Haze

The river seems to have taken on a different mood of late.  We are well into late summer and the bright foliage of spring has given way to a more mellow green.  The flowering plants too, which seemed to be almost exclusively white back in June are now predominantly of purples and mauves.

Purple Loosestrife and Great Willowherb are the most striking of the native plants to inhabit the riverbanks, but they pale into insignificance in comparison to the huge swathes of Himalayan Balsam.  As its name suggests, it's not from these parts, but it has certainly made a home for itself since its introduction in the early nineteenth century.  This invasive species adorns much of the Thames in this area at this time of year.  My Guide to British Wildlife describes its seeds as explosive, but fails to mention its aggressive growth and towering habit.  Indeed, the Environment Agency names it among the seven most aggressive non-native plants in the UK, alongside the likes of Japanese Knotweed and Giant Hogweed.  It grows so vigorously that it shades out all other plant growth in its vicinty.

Even so, I have to admit a certain liking for the plant.  We have lost so many native plants through our our own management of the landscape that it is heartening to find a plant that does such a fine job of providing nectar for our bees and butterflies.

Water Treat

I paid a visit to the local water vole patch about two weeks ago and was disappointed to find no trace.  I was even more concerned to catch a brief glimpse of a mink-sized, mink-shaped and mink-coloured invader.  I could have been mistaken, but the two occurrences seemed related.  I reported my thoughts to the wildlife trust.

I wanted to put my mind at rest though, so a few days ago I revisited the site.  I chose a bright, sunny day, as, I believe, water voles favour such conditions and like to warm themselves while they feed.  Sure enough, I was rewarded with my best views yet, willow being the favoured meal on this occasion.

If At First...

I have ignored the Thames Kingfisher for at least a month or two now.  The frustrations of attempting to film him back in the spring are a distant memory and I have recently spotted a natural perch in the river that he seems to be using on a regular basis.  The challenge is always to get as close as possible without alarming the little chap, to get within the range of my camera lens, but at this time of year, hiding away on the riverbank isn't so difficult, as the vegetation on the banks is at its peak.  However, this also means that the nettles and thistles are also at their tallest and most potent.

Crouched beneath my camouflage net and with my folding stool slowly sinking into the mud, I was pleased to see that the little chap alighted on a dead willow tree in the middle of the river.  Disappointingly, though, almost as soon as he had landed, he took flight again.  You might hear my whispered frustration in the footage below.

Perhaps I wasn't as invisible as I believed.  Or maybe, with the river being quite busy at weekends, he was unsettled anyway.  He didn't land here again anyway and, with the threat of showers looming, I decided to retire to a nearby bird hide.  While this is an altogether more comfortable way of watching the wildlife, it also offers only distant views.  Nonetheless, I was pleased to see that the Kingfisher used these quieter pools from which to fish.  Somewhat ironically, he remained completely unmoved by a pair of juvenile fallow deer grazing and scurrying around nearby.  

I wasn't going to get the shots that I wanted, though, so I decided to head to a small nature reserve, which, rather conveniently, is within walking distance of my home.  Unfortunately, this place has the distinct disadvantage of being a favourite haunt of a large proportion of Oxfordshire's dog-walkers, who choose to ignore the "strictly dogs on leads" signs.  Early weekend mornings and mid-mornings during the week, therefore, tend to be the better times to pay a visit.

My visit began unpromisingly, with rain falling almost as soon as I had sat down.  However, the gloom soon lifted when a Kingfisher appeared and immediately began fishing with a quite impressive strike-rate.  I counted at least a dozen dives, from which he emerged with a meal more often than not.  

These were rich pickings indeed and such a contrast with the Thames bird.

  

I Like Moorhens, But I Couldn't Eat a Whole One

There has been precious little to report on the river of late.  Well, that and the fact that I spent most of July transfixed by a group of men chasing each other around France on bicycles.  So, I was mildly excited to see that a Grey Heron had taken up temporary residence underneath my camera.  I was slightly less excited to see what came next.  Still, we've all got to eat.  If you are of a delicate disposition I apologise for what follows.

I assume that the victim in question was a juvenile Moorhen, since there was plenty of evidence of mature Moorhens in the vicinity from other footage that I captured.  Any other theories welcomed.

Leaving a Good Impression

A couple of weeks have passed since my previous post, largely because there has been very little to report.  Temporary power failure afflicted my camera trap; a spell of wet weather precluded a filming trip; and a heavy cold made anything more than switching TV channels difficult.  So, instead, I decided to review some of the photographs that I have taken in the past few months.

I came across this image that I took back in February.  Having originally dismissed it as an indecipherable jumble, two footprints suddenly stood out to me, with the distinctive comma-shaped, some would say tear-shaped, toes of an otter print.  The lack of a clear impression of a fifth toe was a slight concern.  However, a short email correspondence with the Thames Valley Environmental Records Centre confirmed that I was correct.

These signs were spotted only a few yards from the stretch of river on which I recently captured images of  a female otter and two cubs - but fully four months earlier. The size of the prints, approximately three or four centimetres across would point to them being made by one of the cubs.  The TVERC also confirmed that mine were only two of three recent records on this particular stretch of river.

It almost makes me want to hasten the onset of winter, so that I can carry out a full survey of the river.

Are These What I Think They Are?

I set up my camera trap alongside a small tributary to the Thames over the weekend.  After the driest spring for 100 years, it is looking little better than a muddy ditch.  So, I wasn't holding out much hope of filming anything.  It didn't help that the vegetation started springing up in front of the lens after the heavy rain on Sunday.

However, I got quite excited when I spotted these three individuals swimming upstream.

They are otters aren't they?

It's There in Black and White

Having established that badgers were using this site, I wanted to capture some more informative pictures of the sett's residents.  There are at least three individuals, including, perhaps, two juveniles, but I would like to know more about them.  So, having moved the camera into a more open area, where the vegetation had been flattened, I scattered a few peanuts around to encourage them to linger in shot.

And the results?  Well, they are there in black and white.

Brock and Roll

Now I haven't let fourteen years of marriage force me to surrender to disappointment or frustration easily, so within 24 hours I was scrambling through more undergrowth searching for signs of badger habitation.  A friend had been talking about my aim of filming a badger with my new camera to a local farmer, who said that he had seen signs of them on his land.  So it was, acting on this new information, that same afternoon that we found ourselves in a small copse, not half a mile from our original sett, inspecting several badger-sized holes and a large wad of hay filling one entrance.  This seemed a lot more promising.  The camera was strapped to a tree overlooking three of the entrances to the sett.  We left, nursing several scratches and nettle stings.

Brock and Roll.

Ready, Sett..........Oh

I set my sights on buying a trap camera some time ago and the more I researched the market, the more I wanted the top-of-the-range device, with as many megapixels as possible, infra-red, video and photgraphic facilities.  So, last week I took delivery of the best device I could afford (and/or justify) from Handykam.com.  So efficient was their delivery that it was with me within 24 hours of my order being placed.

After a couple of night's testing in my back garden, largely capturing images of our cat pretending to be a fierce hunter, I was ready for a full field test. A few weeks ago my wife mentioned that she had found what looked very like a badger's sett near to where she keeps her horse.  Therefore, last Friday evening we set out to investigate.

Sure enough, there were many of the hallmarks of badger activity at the site.  There was substantial earthworks in the area; what looked like the main entrance had the characteristic D-shape; and there was possible bedding material lying around.  It was certainly worth setting the camera up to see what it could capture.

Eagerly I returned the following morning and was delighted to discover that the camera had been triggered 37 times.  Concluding that my leaving and returning to the site were likely to have accounted for two of those recordings, I calculated that would mean that I would have 35 images of prime badger activity.

Wrong.  I had thirty-four 30-second videos of a some vegetation waving in the wind and one of an out-of-focus insect spoiling his moment of glory by passing too close to the lens.  This seemed an expensive method of photographing the woods at night.

Expect the Unexpected

Having decided to leave the kingfishers to their own devices for the time being, perhaps it was time for me to catch up with more dependable old friends - in particular, a Barn Owl that hunts within a few miles of home.  I first spotted him a couple of years ago when I was travelling on a bus to work.  He was quartering a field of rough grass and scrub, and, rather thrillingly, flew alongside the bus for fifty yards or so.  Sure enough, I went back to the same spot a few days later and, bang on schedule, he emerged from the north, following the line of a ditch and hunted over the same ground for about twenty minutes.  I haven't visited this place since last autumn though.

No matter how many times I see a Barn Owl, I always marvel at how silent the birds are in flight.  However, when I visited his hunting ground a few days ago, it was all too silent.  I have read recently* that the past two winters have accounted for a decrease of probably 70 or 80% of Barn Owl numbers.  The prolonged cold spell and snow covering the ground would have made life especially difficult for owls that depend heavily on catching small mammals, such as voles and mice.  I can only conclude that my local owl succumbed to the cold and starvation during December, when the weather was at its most inclement.

Feeling slightly deflated, then, I wondered what to do with the rest of my morning.  I had heard that a few miles away there was a local stronghold for water voles, another species that is in decline, but for sharply contrasting reasons.  Habitat loss and predation by mink has seen a decline of around 95% in the water voles' range in the last one hundred years, according to a study by the Wildlife Trusts.  In Oxfordshire, in my experience, this means that populations only seem to occur in small pockets, scattered across the county.  Certainly, I have not seen a water vole along my local stretch of the Thames.  So, it was more in hope than expectation that I set off.

Rather surprisingly, though, almost the first stretch of river that I chose produced a bold and rather entertaining water vole.  He swam and fed within view for a good hour.  The edited highlights are available to view below.  Once again, the local wildlife had not failed to surprise or delight.

*RSPB Birds Magazine

Excitement as Bird Perches on Branch

In a development akin to the pontiff discovering his gaff has a ballustraded platform on the upper floor, The Outside Loo can report avian activity on the new artificial perch at the river.  However, the more alert amongst you will notice that it is not a kingfisher.

I did manage to film one of the birds earlier in the year.  The film below is from April, when there was much less foliage on the willows and the birds were easier to view.  Even so, this is still quite a distant shot.  The bird's call can be heard quite clearly all the same.

However, having spent many fruitless hours hiding under camouflage netting on the riverbank since, it became apparent that I wasn't going to get the photograph that I want.  The kingfishers did not use the new branch once.  I concluded that either I wasn't as hidden as well as I had supposed, or that the branch wasn't useful to these birds.  It simply isn't on their normal flightpath, for instance.

Defeated, I retreated deeper into the undergrowth, further away from the bankside and in a less favourable position for taking photographs.  Almost immediately both birds appeared, calling loudly  to each other and perching just yards away, but out of range of my camera.  I must have been correct to seek a better hiding place.  I didn't want to consider that if I had remained where I was I would have got the shot.

Goldie Lookin Pained

All Right.  I know.  I only wrote this story, so that I could use this headline.  Stick with me though, because there is a story attached; namely that on the way home from the river yesterday afternoon, I came across a goldfinch sitting in the middle of the road.  He didn't move as I approached him and only half-heartedly flapped about when I bent to pick him up.  Supposing that he must have come second in a head-on encounter with a passing vehicle, I ushered him to the side of the road, simultaneously directing traffic around us both; but, it was apparent that this was a goldfinch that wasn't going to take to the skies again in a hurry and would be vulnerable to predation.  That is provided he didn't stagger back into the path of the local traffic first.

Now, my recent record with rescuing small birds is pretty inauspicious, to say the least.  It stands at Grim Reaper 3 The Outside Loo 0.  So, the odds didn't look great for this poor chap.  No matter, I threw my hat over him, gently stuffed him into my pocket and cycled the 5 miles or so home.  He must have grown very attached to that hat, because I couldn't part him from it when I eventually closed the door on his new, temporary home - rather ironically the basket used to transport the cat to the vet.

All evening our hapless goldfinch slept his headache off in his knitted bed, paying no heed to the water and niger seed I had thoughtfully sourced for him.  Just before I retired to my own bed, though, I checked him again.  Encouragingly, he was standing up, was all fluffed up as, I believe, most healthy birds are when they are roosting, with a healthy-looking amount of droppings adorning my favourite beanie.

Which brings us to today.  An early morning inspection confirmed that he was more than ready to take his chance in the outside world again.  So, we made the trip back to the spot at which I had first discovered him, albeit with the cage covered in a thick blanket so that he wouldn't flap about and distress himself.  This is where I took the rather unimpressive photograph at the top of this entry, of our patient leaving his sick bay. (In my defence, it was difficult to choreograph the removal of the blanket, the opening of the basket door and standing back out of the way, while endeavouring to capture the whole process on film).

Still, I'm happier with the headline.

Take Me To The River

I live about ten miles from one of Oxfordshire's major rivers and usually get down there once or twice a month.  Lately, however, I have been visiting twice a week, as the river really comes alive in May.  Recently, I have encountered cuckoos, hobbies and at least four types of warblers - all the usual spring migrants in fact.  However, it is the kingfishers that really interests me and, as they were not in evidence at all over the winter, I have been keen to catch up with how they are doing on "my" stretch of river.  The species would appear to have suffered heavy losses last winter.  I have only seen one pair of kingfishers over a 4 or 5-mile stretch of water.  It was a similar story over the previous winter though and, on the evidence of my own experience last summer, they appeared to bounce back really well.

I have been especially looking forward to getting down to the river this week, as the previous weekend my fellow riparian Finchley and I had installed a new artificial perch over the river, from which no self-respecting kingfisher could resist fishing.

You'll be as keen as I am, then, to see the latest footage that I filmed.

Typically, while I was setting up, a male bullfinch landed on the perch and mooched around for a while before I had even unpacked my camera.  No matter, I was in for the long haul and made myself comfortable.  So, you'll be pleased to know that my morning sat by the river in the cold north-westerly wind wasn't completely wasted.  I managed to capture this footage before I left.

Oh well.  There's always tomorrow.

Another Heath Lost to the Dry Spring

If you follow The Guardian's Country Diary articles, you will know that today was Veronica Heath's last entry.   Read The Guardian's Homage to Veronica Heath.

Estimates vary as to how long she has been writing her regular column, but she put it at around 40 years, which will do for me.  For me, Veronica's writing has always induced a moment of temporary escapism into the Northumberland countryside.  I suppose 83 is a reasonable age at which to retire. Catch up with Veronica Heath's favourite entries here..